Atlantis: legend, history and interesting facts. Atlantis

Atlantis has not disappeared, it exists and lies in the depths of the sea. Much has been said about Atlantis, thousands of research materials have been written. Historians, archaeologists, and searchers have proposed fifty versions of possible locations around the world (in Scandinavia, the Baltic Sea, Greenland, North and South America, in Africa, the Black, Aegean, Caspian Sea, in the Atlantic Ocean, Mediterranean Sea, etc.), but the exact location is not named. – Why is there such confusion?

As you begin to look into it, you discover one regularity: all sentences are initially linked to some similarity, an ancient find, a single description to which the materials were subsequently “adjusted.” As a result, nothing worked. There is a similarity, but Atlantis cannot be found.

“We will go the other way”!

Let's look for Atlantis in a different way, which in this case (judging by the known proposals) has not been used by anyone before. – First, let’s take the exclusion method, where Atlantis could not exist. As we narrow the circle, we will use all the “reference points” that were proposed by the ancient Greek scientist, sage (428-347 BC) Plato (Aristocles) in his works – “Timaeus” and “Critius”. These documents provide the only and fairly detailed description of Atlantis, its inhabitants and historical events related to the life of the legendary island.

“Aristotle taught me to satisfy my mind only with what reasoning convinces me of, and not just with the authority of teachers. Such is the power of truth: you try to refute it, but your very attacks elevate it and give it greater value.” (XVI century, Italian philosopher, physicist, mathematician Galileo Galilei).

So, let's start cutting off the ends. – Atlantis could not be located in any distant corner of the world, not even in the Atlantic Ocean. The war (according to the history of the narrative) between Athens and Atlantis could not have happened anywhere except in the Mediterranean Sea in this “patch of civilization” due to the limitations of human development. The world is big, but the developed world is narrow. Athens simply would not have been able to reach the borders of Atlantis with its army and navy. Water and vast distances were an insurmountable obstacle. “This barrier was insurmountable for people, because ships and shipping did not yet exist.” (Plato, Critias).

In ancient Greek mythology, which arose many thousands of years after the destruction of Atlantis, the only (!) hero Hercules (according to Homer - XII century BC) accomplished a feat, traveling to the farthest western point of the world - to the edge Mediterranean Sea. “When the Atlas Mountains appeared on Hercules’ way, he did not climb them, but cut his way through, thus creating the Strait of Gibraltar and connecting the Mediterranean Sea with the Atlantic. This point served as the border for sailors in the ancient era, therefore, in a figurative sense, “Pillars of Hercules” is the end of the world, the limit of the world, and the expression “to reach the pillars of Hercules” means “to reach the limit.” What western limit Hercules reached (“the edge of the world”) was unattainable for other mortals.

Thus, Atlantis was closer to the center of ancient civilization - it was in the Mediterranean Sea. But where exactly?

There were seven pairs of the Pillars of Hercules (according to Plato’s narrative, behind which lay the island of Atlantis) in the Mediterranean Sea! (Gibraltar, Dardanelles, Bosphorus, Kerch Strait, Mouth of the Nile, etc.). The pillars were located at the entrances to the straits and had the same names - Hercules (later the Latin name - Hercules). The pillars served as landmarks and beacons for ancient sailors.

“First of all, let us briefly recall that, according to legend, nine thousand years ago there was a war between those peoples who lived on the other side of the Pillars of Hercules and all those who lived on this side: we have to tell about this war... How we have already mentioned, this was once an island larger than Libya and Asia (not their entire geographical territory, but rather areas inhabited in ancient times), but now it has collapsed due to earthquakes and turned into impassable silt, blocking the way for sailors who would try to sail from us into the open sea, and making sailing unthinkable.” (Plato, Critias).

This information about Atlantis, dating back to the 6th century BC. came from the Egyptian priest Timeus from the city of Sais (on the coast of Africa, western Nile Delta, the current name of the village of Sa el-Hagar). When Timaeus said that the barrier from the remains of the sunken Atlantis blocked the way - “from us to the open sea,” this clearly indicated that Atlantis was on its way from the Egyptian mouth of the Nile to the wide waters of the Mediterranean Sea. In ancient times, the entrance to the main (western) mouth of the Nile, nicknamed the mouth of Hercules, that is, Hercules, where the city of Hercules and the temple in honor of Hercules were located, was also called the Pillars of Hercules.

Over time, the silt and floating material from the sunken Atlantis were carried across the sea, and the island itself sank even deeper into the abyss. “Since many great floods occurred in nine thousand years (and that is exactly how many years have passed from those times to this day), the earth did not accumulate in the form of any significant shallows, as in other places, but was washed away by the waves and then disappeared into the abyss. (Plato, Critias).

We exclude further impossible locations.

Atlantis could not be in the Mediterranean Sea north of the island Crete. Today in that area there are countless numbers of fish scattered throughout the waters. small islands, which does not correspond to the story of the flooding (!) and by this very fact excludes this entire territory. Moreover, there would not be enough space to place Atlantis (according to the description of its size) in the sea north of Crete.

Expedition of a famous explorer depths of the sea French oceanographer Jacques-Yves Cousteau to the area north of Crete on the periphery of the islands of Thira (Strongele), Fera discovered the remains of an ancient sunken city, but from the above it follows that it most likely belongs to another civilization than Atlantis.

In the archipelago of islands Aegean Sea earthquakes and disasters associated with volcanic activity are known, leading to local subsidence of the earth, and according to new evidence they occur in our time (for example, a sunken medieval fortress in the Aegean Sea near the city of Marmaris in a bay on the coast of Turkey).

Narrowing the search, we come to the conclusion that Atlantis could only be in one place opposite the Mouth of the Nile - to the south and east of the island Crete. She lies there today at a depth, having fallen into a deep basin of the sea. The collapse of an almost oval water area with influxes from the shores, horizontal wrinkling (from sliding) of sedimentary rocks towards the center of the “funnel” is clearly visible from an online review of the seabed from space. The bottom of the sea in this place resembles a pit, sprinkled with soft sedimentary rock on top; there is no hard “crust-mantle” below. A hole not overgrown with “bone” inside is on the body of the Earth, “point your finger and you will fall through.”

The Egyptian priest Timaeus, in his story about the location of the silt from the flooded Atlantis, gives a link to the Pillars of Hercules (closest to it at the mouth of the Western Nile). In another case (later), already when Plato described the power of Atlantis we're talking about about other pillars (as mentioned above, there were seven of them in the Mediterranean). Later, when Plato set out the text of his retelling work, Timaeus had been gone for 200 years by that time, and there was no one to clarify the information about which pillars were being discussed. From this arose all the subsequent confusion with the location of Atlantis.

“After all, according to the evidence of our records, your state (Athens) put a limit on the insolence of countless military forces that set off to conquer all of Europe and Asia, and kept their path from Atlantic sea. [...] On this island, called Atlantis, arose a kingdom of amazing size and power, whose power extended over the entire island, many other islands and part of the mainland, and moreover, on this side of the strait they took possession of Libya right up to to Egypt and Europe up to Tyrrhenia ( West Coast Italy). (Plato, Timaeus).

The sea that washed the island of Atlantis (between Crete and Egypt) was called in ancient times the Atlantic; it was located in the Mediterranean Sea, as well as modern seas Aegean, Tyrrhenian, Adriatic, Ionian. Subsequently, due to an error in linking Atlantis not to the Nile, but to the Gibraltar pillars, the name “Atlantic” spread to the ocean across the strait. The once inland Atlantic Sea, due to inaccurate interpretation and description (by Plato, Critias or Solon), became the Atlantic Ocean. As the Russian proverb says: - “We got lost in three pines” (in seven pairs of pillars). When Atlantis sank into the abyss of the sea, the Atlantic Sea disappeared along with it.

Timaeus, narrating the history of Atlantis, noted that the victory of Athens brought freedom from slavery to all other peoples (including the Egyptians) who had not yet been enslaved by the Atlanteans - “on this side of the Pillars of Hercules” (talking about themselves - about Egypt).

“It was then, Solon, that your state showed the whole world a brilliant proof of its valor and strength: surpassing everyone in its strength of spirit and experience in military affairs, it first stood at the head of the Hellenes, but because of its allies it found itself left to its own devices, and faced the extreme dangers and yet defeated the conquerors and erected victorious trophies. It saved those who were not yet enslaved from the threat of slavery; but all the rest, no matter how many of us lived on this side of the Pillars of Hercules, it generously made free. But later, when the time came for unprecedented earthquakes and floods, in one terrible day all your military strength was swallowed up by the opening of the earth; likewise, Atlantis disappeared, plunging into the abyss. After this, the sea in those places became, to this day, unnavigable and inaccessible due to shallowing caused by the huge amount of silt that the settled island left behind.” (Plato, Timaeus).

The location of Atlantis can be further clarified from the description of the island itself.

“Poseidon, having received the island of Atlantis as his inheritance..., approximately in this place: from the sea to the middle of the island a plain stretched, according to legend, more beautiful than all other plains and very fertile.” (Plato, Timaeus).

“Firstly, it was said that this entire region lay very high and dropped steeply to the sea, but the entire plain surrounding the city (capital) and itself surrounded by mountains that stretched all the way to the sea, was a flat surface, three thousand in length stades (580 km), and in the direction from the sea to the middle - two thousand (390 km). This entire part of the island was facing the south wind, and was closed from the north by mountains. These mountains are praised by legend because they were superior in number, size and beauty to all those present today. The plain... was an oblong quadrangle, mostly rectilinear.” (Plato, Critias).

So, following the description, a rectangular plain of 580 by 390 kilometers stretched approximately to the middle of the island, open to the south and closed from the north by large and high mountains. Fitting these dimensions into the geographical map of the “Atlantic” Sea north of the mouth of the Nile, we obtain that southern part Atlantis could be adjacent to Africa (in the area of the current Libyan cities of Tobruk, Derna, Egyptian cities on the coast west of Alexandria), and its northern mountainous part could be (but not a fact) the island of Crete.

The story about the fauna of the island speaks in favor of the fact that Atlantis was connected to Africa in earlier times (than its mention in the ancient Egyptian papyri), namely tens of thousands of years ago.

“There were even a great many elephants on the island, for there was enough food not only for all other living creatures inhabiting swamps, lakes and rivers, mountains or plains, but also for this beast, the largest and most voracious of all animals.” (Plato, Critias).

It should also be taken into account that with the end of the Ice Age and the beginning of the melting of the northern glaciers, the level of the world's oceans rose by 50-70 meters and the part of the land that once connected Atlantis and Africa was gradually flooded. Elephants and, by the way, people - the inhabitants of the island (named after their king Atlanta - Atlanteans) who came here earlier from the depths of Africa remained surrounded by the sea. The Atlanteans were ordinary modern people, and not four-meter giants, otherwise Athens would not have been able to defeat them. The island, isolated position of the inhabitants prompted civilization to develop separately (without wars and external enemies), active, and ahead of external warring barbarians (fortunately, everything necessary was on the island).

On Atlantis (in its capital, which looks like a hill extinct volcano) there were hot springs mineral water, this indicates the high seismic activity of the territory and the “thin” mantle of the earth’s crust... “a cold spring and a spring hot water, which provided water in abundance, and, moreover, amazing both in taste and in healing power.” (Plato, Critias).

I will not speculate now what caused the “internal hiccups of the Earth”, as a result of which Atlantis sank into the basin of the Mediterranean Sea within a day, and later even deeper. Exactly in that place, along the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea, the border between the African and European continental tectonic plates passes. The depth of the sea there is very large - about 3000-4000 meters. It is possible that a powerful impact from a giant meteorite North America in Mexico, which, according to the US National Academy of Sciences, occurred 13 thousand years ago (around that time) caused the inertial movement of plates in the Mediterranean.

Just as continents, creeping on each other, breaking their edges, rear up mountains - the same process, but in the opposite direction, when diverging, forms depressions. The African plate moved slightly away from Europe, and this was quite enough to lower Atlantis into the abyss of the sea. The fact that Africa, earlier in the history of the Earth, was moving away from Europe and Asia is clearly evidenced by the visible huge intercontinental rift from the Mediterranean Sea in two directions - the Suez Canal, the Red Sea, the Dead Sea, the Gulf of Aqaba, the Aden, Oman and Persian Gulfs.

It is possible (but not a fact) that the current island of Crete, the former northern highest mountainous part of Atlantis, did not fall into the abyss of the sea, but, having broken away, remained on the “European continental cornice”. On the other hand, if you look at Crete by geographical map, then it does not stand on the very cliff of the mantle of the European continent, but about 100 kilometers from the basin of the Mediterranean (Atlantic) Sea. This means that there was no catastrophic landslide fault of Atlantis along the current coastline of the island of Crete; it only, as an independent unit, was part of the archipelago of the island of Atlantis.

Historians and archaeologists write: “Excavations on Crete show that even four to five thousand years after the supposed death of Atlantis, the inhabitants of this Mediterranean island sought to settle further from the coast. (Memory of Ancestors). An unknown fear drove them to the mountains. The first centers of agriculture and culture are also located at some distance from the sea."

The former proximity of Atlantis to Africa and the mouth of the Nile is indirectly evidenced by the extensive Qattara depression (minus 133 meters below sea level), in the Libyan Desert in Egypt, 50 km away. from the Mediterranean coast, also a lowland west of Alexandria. In addition, along the tectonic fault line is the Dead Sea lowland (minus 395 meters) in Israel. They all talk about a territorial catastrophe that once occurred nearby due to land subsidence.

What does it mean to establish the exact location of Atlantis?

Perhaps not much. The Mediterranean trench is too deep. At first, the silt, earth, and subsequent sedimentary deposits and landslide rocks that rose and then settled to the bottom densely covered Atlantis. The golden capital, with its countless treasures in the temple of Poseidon, was located closest to Africa and ended up at the very depths (in the center of the depression). Perhaps searches in the southern part of the coast of Crete will bring something, but this is unlikely, since the South Cretan European continental “ledge-cornice” over the millennia was literally “licked by the sea to bare stone,” and everything that was from the Atlanteans - long ago washed away into the basin. Who will dig in the depths of the sea, who will look for the fallen “necklace in the crater of a volcano”? “That’s why nothing from Atlantis has been found so far.”

But the only thing that is inspiring is that the confusion with the “Pillars of Hercules” has been successfully resolved, and the location of Atlantis has finally been established.

Researchers who are confident in the authenticity of information from Plato’s dialogues believe that the destruction of the island occurred in the period from 9593 to 9583 BC. This date is indicated by some data in the dialogues Timaeus and Critias. Critias, a statesman who lived in the second half of the 5th century BC, told Plato the story he read in the notes of his grandfather, Solon, which he kept from the words of an Egyptian priest in 593-583 BC. According to Critias, Atlantis perished exactly 9,000 years before these records, so it turns out that about 11,560 years have passed since the destruction of the island. The author located Atlantis directly behind the Pillars of Hercules or Heracles, i.e. in the Atlantic behind the rocks framing the entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar. And although some place Atlantis in the Black Sea, the Andes and even the Caribbean Sea, these are the most accurate coordinates and dates available to historians.

The death of the legendary state

According to Plato, Atlantis belonged to the ruler of the seas, Poseidon, who gave it to his sons from a mortal woman to rule over. The state grew and prospered, it was incredibly rich, had great influence on neighboring states and conducted brisk trade with them. But over time, the inhabitants “corrupted” and the ancient gods decided to punish them. Plato's description of the death of Atlantis comes down to two main factors - and the subsequent tsunami. First, the earth began to shake, cracks appeared in the soil, many people died in a few hours, and then a flood began, plunging the island to the bottom.

Skeptics claim that Solon confused the Egyptian hieroglyphs for hundreds and thousands and wrote down 9000 years instead of 900.

Versions of the death of Atlantis

One of the main versions of the death of Atlantis is considered to be the eruption of an underwater volcano, which gave rise to an earthquake and tsunami. No less popular is the version about the death of the continent as a result of the shift of tectonic plates. By the way, in this version Atlantis is called the antipode of Great Britain, i.e. Atlantis sank on one side of the scale, and England on the other. The reason for this shift, according to various researchers, could be the fall of a large asteroid in the area of the Bermuda Triangle or off the coast of Japan, the capture by the Earth of its current satellite - the Moon, a change in geographical poles as a result of periodic “castling”. This is indicated from ancient texts that “The Earth was once again renewed” or “reborn,” i.e. ancient peoples had the knowledge that such processes are natural and periodic.

In different parts of the world, the picture of the cataclysm could differ significantly. In some places, pieces of a falling cosmic body and the consequences of destruction could be visible, in others - only roar and giant waves.

In the myths and legends of different peoples, there are updated versions of the death of civilizations that existed before the first. So, for example, the Chilam-Balam describes the fall of some celestial body, the ensuing earthquake and flood: “it walked,” “a great serpent fell from the sky,” “and its bones and skin fell to the ground,” “and then the terrible waves." Other legends say that “the sky fell” and in a short time, day turned to night several times.

Modern researchers of the Atlantis problem argue that such a catastrophe could happen again. The melting of glaciers in recent decades has become increasingly intense, this can lead to desalination of the waters of the world's oceans, the disappearance of the warm Gulf Stream current and a rise in water levels by several tens of meters. As a result, most of the coastal areas will be flooded, and many lands will repeat the fate of the legendary Atlantis.

About the best state structure. Having briefly described the ideal state, Socrates complains about the abstractness and sketchiness of the resulting picture and expresses the desire “listen to a description of how this state behaves in the fight against other states, how it enters into war in a manner worthy of it, how during the war its citizens do what befits them, in accordance with their training and upbringing, whether on the battlefield or in negotiations with each of the other states". Responding to this wish, the third participant in the dialogue, the Athenian politician Critias, sets out the story of the war between Athens and Atlantis, allegedly from the words of his grandfather Critias the Elder, who, in turn, retold him the story of Solon, who the latter heard from the priests in Egypt. The meaning of the story is this: once upon a time, 9 thousand years ago (from the period of the life of Socrates, Critias and other contemporaries of Solon), Athens was the most glorious, powerful and virtuous state. Their main rival was the aforementioned Atlantis. “This island was larger than Libya and Asia combined”. It arose “a kingdom of amazing size and power”, which owned all of Libya to Egypt and Europe to Tyrrhenia (western Italy). All the forces of this kingdom were thrown into the enslavement of Athens. The Athenians stood up to defend their freedom at the head of the Hellenes; and although all their allies betrayed them, they alone, thanks to their valor and virtue, repelled the invasion, crushed the Atlanteans and freed the peoples they had enslaved. Following this, however, a huge natural disaster occurred, as a result of which the entire army of the Athenians died in one day, and Atlantis sank to the bottom of the sea.

The dialogue “Critias”, with the same participants, serves as a direct continuation of “Timaeus” and is entirely devoted to Critias’ story about ancient Athens and Atlantis. Athens then (before the earthquake and flood) was the center of a large and unusually fertile country; they were inhabited by a virtuous people who enjoyed the ideal (from Plato’s point of view) state structure. Namely, everything was controlled by rulers and warriors who lived separately from the main agricultural and craft masses on the Acropolis as a communist community. Modest and virtuous Athens is contrasted with the arrogant and powerful Atlantis. The ancestor of the Atlanteans, according to Plato, was the god Poseidon, who met with the mortal girl Cleito, who gave birth to ten divine sons led by the eldest, Atlas, between whom he divided the island and who became the ancestors of his royal families. The central plain of the island stretched 3 thousand stadia in length (540 km), in width - 2 thousand stadia (360 km), the center of the island was a hill located 50 stadia (8-9 kilometers) from the sea. For protection, Poseidon surrounded it with three water and two land rings; The Atlanteans threw bridges over these rings and dug canals, so that ships could sail along them to the city itself or, more precisely, to the central island, which had 5 stades (somewhat less than a kilometer) in diameter. On the island stood temples, lined with silver and gold and surrounded by golden statues, a luxurious royal palace, and there were also shipyards filled with ships, etc., etc. “ The kings surrounded the island on which the palace stood, (...) as well as earthen rings and a bridge the width of a pletra (30 m) with circular stone walls and placed towers and gates everywhere on the bridges at the passages to the sea. They mined white, black and red stone in the depths of the middle island and in the depths of the outer and inner earthen rings, and in the quarries, where there were recesses on both sides, covered with the same stone, they arranged anchorages for ships. If they made some of their buildings simple, then in others, for fun, they skillfully combined stones of different colors, giving them a natural charm; They also covered the entire circumference of the walls around the outer earthen ring in copper, applying the metal in molten form, the wall of the inner shaft was covered with tin casting, and the wall of the acropolis itself was covered with orichalcum, which gave off a fiery shine.».

In general, Plato devotes a lot of space to describing the incredible wealth and fertility of the island, its dense population, rich natural world(according to the author, even elephants lived there), etc.

As long as the divine nature remained in the Atlanteans, they disdained wealth, putting virtue above it; but when the divine nature degenerated, mixing with the human, they became mired in luxury, greed and pride. Outraged by this spectacle, Zeus planned to destroy the Atlanteans and convened a meeting of the gods. At this point the dialogue - at least the text that has reached us - ends.

In this description it is not difficult to discern Plato’s ideals and the reality surrounding Plato. The Timaeus simulates the situation of the Greco-Persian wars, but in an idealized form; the Athenians who defeated the arrogant Atlanteans are not the real Athenians of the 5th century BC. e. with all their shortcomings, but ideal virtuous sages, partly reminiscent of the Spartans, but morally much higher than them; They accomplish their feat alone, not sharing glory with anyone, and at the same time they do not use the victory to create their own empire (as the real Athenians of the 5th century BC did), but generously provide freedom to all peoples. But in the description of Atlantis there are features of the Athenian sea power hated by Plato, with its tireless pursuit of wealth and power, constant expansion, entrepreneurial trade and craft spirit, etc.

It is believed that Plato's original goal was to expose the Atlanteans, portraying them as a completely negative example of greed and pride generated by wealth and the pursuit of power - a kind of dystopia, contrasted with the utopian Athens; but, having begun to describe Atlantis, Plato got carried away and, for purely artistic reasons, created an attractive image of a luxurious and powerful power, so that Atlantis, as a utopia, completely eclipsed the pale sketch of poor and virtuous Athens. It is possible that it was precisely this discrepancy between the plan and the result that was the reason that the dialogue was not completed.

Other ancient authors

Modern Atlantologists tend to include among references to Atlantis stories about the Atlanteans - an African (apparently Berber) tribe in the Atlas Mountains, spoken of by Herodotus, Diodorus Siculus and Pliny the Elder; These Atlanteans, according to their stories, did not have their own names, did not see dreams, and were ultimately exterminated by their neighbors, the troglodytes; Diodorus Siculus also reports that they fought with the Amazons. As for Atlantis itself, the popular belief boiled down to the phrase (attributed to Aristotle) that “the creator himself made it disappear.” This opinion was opposed by Posidonius, who, being interested in the facts of land subsidence, on this basis found the story plausible (Strabo, Geography, II, 3.6). In the II century. Aelian, who was, in fact, only a collector of anecdotes, among other things, reports how the kings of the Atlanteans dressed - in the skins of male “sea rams”, and the queens wore a headdress made from the skins of the females of these unknown animals, in order to emphasize their origin from Poseidon; probably this story - the fruit of someone's imagination. In the 5th century Neoplatonist Proclus, in his comments to the Timaeus, talks about Plato's follower Crantor, who around 260 BC. e. specially visited Egypt in order to learn about Atlantis and allegedly saw columns with inscriptions telling her story in the temple of the goddess Neith in Sais. Moreover he writes: “That an island of this character and size once existed is evident from the accounts of certain writers who have explored the environs of the Outer Sea. For, according to them, in that sea in their time there were seven islands dedicated to Persephone, and also three other islands huge size, one of which was dedicated to Pluto, the other to Ammon, and then to Poseidon, the dimensions of which were a thousand stadia (180 km); and their inhabitants - he adds - preserved the traditions coming from their ancestors about the immeasurably larger island of Atlantis, which actually existed there and which for many generations ruled all the islands and was likewise dedicated to Poseidon. Now Marcellus has described this in Aethiopica.” This Marcellus is unknown from other sources; it is believed that his “Ethiopica” is simply a novel.

Possible date of death of Atlantis

Athenian politician Critias was born in 460 BC. He could tell the story of the war between Athens and Atlantis only after reaching adulthood approximately after 440 BC. The dialogue "Critias" does not mention the Peloponnesian War, which began in 431 BC. Thus, Critias presented information about Atlantis in the period from 440 BC. to 431 BC being a young politician, since he received all the information from his grandfather. According to Plato's instructions about the catastrophe exactly 9000 years ago, the destruction of Atlantis occurred in the period from 9440 BC. to 9431 BC

Existence hypotheses

Atlantis - Plato's invention

The most common opinion among historians and especially philologists is that the story of Atlantis is a typical philosophical myth, examples of which are replete with Plato’s dialogues. Indeed, Plato, unlike Aristotle and even more so historians, never set out to communicate to the reader any real facts, but only ideas illustrated by philosophical myths. To the extent that the story is verifiable, it is refuted by all available archaeological material. Indeed, there are no traces of any advanced civilization in Greece or in western Europe and Africa, either at the end of the glacial and post-glacial periods, or in the subsequent millennia. It is significant that supporters of the historicity of Atlantis often ignore the verifiable part of the dialogues (including the theme of the Athenian civilization, which plays the most important role) and focus their research exclusively on the unverifiable part - Atlantis. Further, the source of information is declared to be the Egyptian priests (who were reputed in Greece as the guardians of mysterious ancient wisdom); however, among the many ancient Egyptian texts, nothing even remotely resembling Plato's story has been found. All names and titles in Plato's text are Greek, which also testifies more in favor of their composition by Plato, rather than his reproduction of any ancient legends. True, Plato explains this by the fact that Solon de translated “barbarian” names into Greek; but such treatment of names was never practiced in Greece.

In addition, Atlantis fit perfectly into Plato's scheme of involution of political forms - their gradual transition to more primitive forms of existence. According to Plato, the world was first ruled by kings, then by aristocrats, then by the people (demos) and, finally, by the crowd (ochlos). Plato consistently found the power of the aristocracy, the people and the crowd in the history of Greek city-states. But he could not find the power of “god-like kings” who created powerful powers in Greece. In this sense, Atlantis fits perfectly into the logic of Plato's socio-philosophical theory.

As for the death of Atlantis, it is obvious that, having invented this country, Plato had to destroy it simply for external plausibility (to explain the absence of traces of such a civilization in the modern era). That is, the picture of the death of Atlantis is dictated entirely by the internal tasks of the text.

The most plausible hypothesis about the sources of the story names two events that occurred during Plato's lifetime: the defeat and death of the Athenian army and navy during an attempt to conquer Sicily in 413 BC. e. , and the death of the town of Helica in the Peloponnese in 373 BC. e. (Gelika was submerged overnight as a result of an earthquake accompanied by a flood; for several centuries its remains were clearly visible under water and sand).

Atlantis in the Atlantic Ocean

The Strait of Gibraltar (and directly the rocks of Gibraltar and Ceuta) was always called the Pillars of Hercules (tracing the Phoenician “pillars of Melqart”) in antiquity. Plato thus places Atlantis directly beyond the Strait of Gibraltar, near the coast of Spain and what is now Morocco. Morocco among the Greeks, as a country in the far West, is the seat of the titan Atlas (Atlas), to whose name the name of the ocean and the Atlas ridge go back; undoubtedly, the name of Atlantis - “the country of Atlas” - goes back to him (in the later dialogue “Critias” Plato calls the first king of the country Atlas and derives the name from him; but initially, apparently, the name simply meant “a country lying in the extreme West” ).

The most consistent supporters of the real existence of Atlantis appealed to the same considerations, pointing out that according to Plato it could only be in the Atlantic Ocean and nowhere else. In particular, they noted that only in the Atlantic Ocean could a land of the dimensions described by Plato fit - a central island of 3000x2000 stadia (530x350 km), and several large accompanying islands. An ardent apologist for this version was N.F. Zhirov. From his point of view, Atlantis was located in the Azores region, and was once the surface part of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. The large area of the island at that time is explained either by lower sea levels, or by the consequences of an earthquake, or by a combination of factors. A similar version is shared by M. Baigent ( English).

Many explorers searched for Atlantis in the area of the Balearic and Canary Islands. Vyacheslav Kudryavtsev in the magazine “Around the World” suggested, based on the texts of Plato and data on the last glacial maximum (ending 10 thousand years ago, which corresponds to the time indicated in “Critia”), that Atlantis was located on the site of the current British Isles and Ireland. and drowned as a result of melting glaciers.

Atlantis in the Mediterranean Sea

Plato's story about Atlantis can be considered as a myth, the basis for which was historical events during which, as a result of a natural disaster (earthquakes, floods or some other cataclysms), or against their background, a previously successful civilization perished or fell into decay . Such a historical event could be the eruption of a volcano on the island of Santorini and the subsequent decline of the highly developed (by the standards of that time) Minoan civilization in the Mediterranean Sea.

In this case, the area of Atlantis given by Plato and the 9-thousand-year-old occurrence of the event are considered an exaggeration, and the prototype of Atlantis is the island of Crete, and most importantly, the island of Santorini, partially destroyed by a volcanic explosion and the collapse of the caldera (another name is Thira, in ancient times Strongyla). The ancient Minoan civilization that existed on Crete and neighboring islands really declined after the volcanic eruption and its explosion on the island of Strongyla in the 17th century BC. e., that is, not 9000, but 900 years before Plato. The catastrophic volcanic eruption "in one day and a disastrous night" led to the destruction of the island, creating a huge tsunami that hit the northern coast of Crete (the largest part of the island metropolis) and other islands in this part of the Mediterranean Sea, and was accompanied by earthquakes. Volcanic ash covered fields on the islands and the coast of the mainland within a radius of hundreds of kilometers, which, with a layer thickness of more than 10 cm, makes them unsuitable for cultivation for a year or more, thereby causing famine. Given the local wind pattern, the bulk of the ash should have fallen in an east-southeast direction, without affecting Greece and Egypt. At the same time, the Minoans, like the Atlanteans described by Plato, actually had military clashes with the Achaeans who inhabited mainland Greece (as they were actively involved in piracy). And the Minoans were indeed defeated by the Achaeans, although not to natural disaster, but only after it.

Widely known description Plato, the island of Atlantis inside had a concentric channel along which ships could sail, with exits to the open sea. This corresponds in shape to an island volcanic caldera with a ring ridge and a central island. Geological studies of the Santorini islands and sediments in the eastern Mediterranean indicate that an older caldera previously existed on the site of the current caldera, formed as a result of a similar eruption about 20,000 years ago. However, all known calderas are much smaller in size, according to Plato, than “Libya (the ancient Greek name for Africa) and Asia combined.” This discrepancy can be explained, firstly, by exaggeration and distortion accumulated over hundreds of years of oral transmission of legends about real events (especially since the real sizes of Asia and Africa were unknown to the Greeks at that time), and secondly, the indicated sizes can be comparable with the actual sizes of the sea Minoan power, which extended not only to the Cyclades Islands, Crete and Cyprus, but also to the coastal regions of Greece, Asia Minor and North Africa (like the subsequent Phoenician and Greek colonies).

A fairly detailed presentation of this version, with comparative analysis Plato's texts and factual materials obtained by the end of the 20th century by history, archeology, geology and related sciences are available in the book by Doctor of Geological and Mineralogical Sciences, employee of the Institute of the History of Natural Science and Technology. S.I. Vavilova RAS I.A. Rezanov "Atlantis: fantasy or reality?" (M., “Nauka”, 1975). This version of the essence and death of the so-called Atlantis is not particularly popular, although it is confirmed from a scientific point of view by a sufficient amount of facts, largely because in this case the aura of mystery that has shrouded the very concept of Atlantis for centuries is lost. For most people close to this topic, it is much more interesting and exciting to fantasize about perfect Atlanteans, mysterious orichalcum, a huge country with a highly developed civilization that suddenly disappeared, etc. One of the clear proofs of this is the size and content of this article, as well as the abundance of pseudo-scientific opuses and works of art of various genres on this topic. "Atlantis(tm)" is something of an openly licensed commercial franchise, and destroying it in the minds of consumers is simply not profitable.

Circumpontic region (Black Sea)

Reconstruction of the size of the lake that existed on the site of the Black Sea

Black Sea flood theory

The prototype for the events of the legend of Atlantis could be the catastrophic rise in the level of the Black Sea, which may have occurred in the sixth millennium BC. It is estimated that during this Black Sea flood, in less than a year, sea level rose by 60 meters (other estimates - from 10 to 80 meters) due to the breach of the Bosphorus by Mediterranean waters.

The flooding of large areas of the northern Black Sea coast could, in turn, give impetus to the spread of various cultural and technological innovations from this region to Europe and Asia.

Indo-European expansion

Events such as the formation and collapse of the Indo-European community, which led to the beginning of large-scale Indo-European expansion at the end of the 4th millennium BC, may also be associated with the legend of the prosperous Atlantis and its death. e. Geographically, these events are tied to the regions adjacent to the Black Sea. Thus, one of the hypotheses for the location of the homeland of the native peoples of the Proto-Indo-European language, proposed by V. A. Safronov, relates to the Danube (Northern Balkan) region. The hypothesis also assumes that the emergence of writing, fortified cities, division of labor, centralized control, the emergence of social classes and the emergence of the first civilization based on the Vinca culture are tied to this community. When comparing Plato's legend with the events of the 4th millennium BC. e. coincidence in time is achieved by the interpretation proposed by A. Ya. Anoprienko of the period of 9000 years indicated by Plato as 9000 seasons of 121-122 days.

Other region bindings

To the west of the Black Sea, the Lower Danube Plain, surrounded by mountains, is clearly visible. The rectangle measures 534 km by 356 km (3000 by 2000 stadia at 178 meters/stadia). A circle is drawn around the island. Zmeiny, located 35 km east of the Danube Delta

The Romanian researcher Nikolai Densusheanu in his work “Prehistoric Dacia” (1913) identified the Atlas Mountains with the southern Carpathians in the Oltenia region, and Atlantis as a whole with Romania, noting the correspondence of the size and location of the Lower Danube Plain with the description of the central plain of Atlantis and introducing the assumption that Plato mixed the terms “ river" - "sea" - "ocean" on the one hand, and "island" - "country" on the other.

With such a connection, it becomes difficult to find a correspondence to the capital of Atlantis, which, according to Plato, was located 9-10 km from the coast and was located in the center of the city low mountain. There are no seamounts in the Danube Delta, and the only island- O. Serpentine, has no signs of human presence until the 7th century BC. e. , although the ancient Greeks built a temple on the island dedicated to Achilles and in written sources (ancient Greek. Νησος Λευκη - White Island) it is sometimes referred to as the Island of the Blessed.

Antarctic hypothesis

One of the hypotheses states that Antarctica is the lost Atlantis. It is based on cartographic artifacts (the Piri Reis map, etc.), which were allegedly created on the basis of dozens of ancient maps attributed to civilizations with advanced navigation that existed 6-15 thousand years ago. This hypothesis is described in detail in the book "Traces of the Gods" by writer Graham Hancock. According to the author, Antarctica was shifted towards the south pole as a result of lithospheric shift. And before that it was closer to the equator and was not covered with ice. However, this assumption contradicts modern scientific ideas about the geological movement of continents. There is also a version associated not with the movement of continents, but with a displacement of the earth’s axis as a result of a planetary cataclysm 10-15 thousand years ago (for example, “a collision of the Earth with a cosmic body of enormous mass”), before which Antarctica was not at the south pole and had a warm climate, rich flora and fauna, was inhabited by people and built up with cities, some of which are allegedly visible in satellite photographs. This version also contradicts scientific ideas about the consequences of the fall of various celestial bodies to the Earth, the impossibility of a rapid catastrophic shift of the earth's axis, the dating of Antarctic glaciation, etc.

Atlantis in the Andes

The most large river one of the local ones is called Vignake, there are large, very ancient structures located there, noticeably dilapidated by time and turned into ruins; they must have survived many centuries. Asking local Indians about who built this antiquity, they answer that other white and bearded people like us who ruled long before the Incas; they say that they came to these lands and made their home here. These and other ancient buildings in this kingdom, it seems to me, are not the same in appearance as those that the Incas built or ordered to be built. Because it the building was square, and the Inca buildings are long and narrow. There is also a rumor that there were some letters on one stone slab of this building. I do not claim and do not believe that in past times certain people arrived here who were so intelligent and intelligent that they built these and other things that we do not see.

Cieza de Leon, Pedro. Chronicle of Peru. Part one. Chapter LXXXVII.

Later, this story became known to many other historians and chroniclers of Peru, as well as missionaries from Catholic orders, who spread their own story about the European origin of the supreme god Viracocha, which was reflected in numerous Indian myths. In particular, Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa studied the hypothesis about the location of Atlantis in the Andes in the most detail in the book “History of the Incas” ( Historia de los Incas ).

In the book Atlantis: The Andes Solution, Jim Allen presented a theory identifying Atlantis with the Altiplano plateau in South America. The theory is based on several arguments.

Atlantis in Brazil

Fawcett considered a figurine made of black basalt as material evidence of the existence of an unknown prehistoric civilization in Brazil. According to Fawcett, experts from the British Museum could not explain to him the origin of the figurine, and for this purpose he turned to a psychometrist for help, who described, upon contact with this artifact, “a large, irregularly shaped continent stretching from the northern coast of Africa to South America,” on which then a natural disaster struck. The name of the continent was Atladta .

According to Fawcett, on his 1921 expedition he was able to collect new evidence of the remains of ancient cities by visiting the area of the Gongozhi River in the Brazilian state of Bahia. In 1925, Fawcett and his companions did not return from the search for lost cities in the upper reaches of the Xingu River; the circumstances of the death of the expedition remained unknown.

Atlantis in Theosophy

Theosophists believe that the Atlantean civilization reached its peak between 1,000,000 and 900,000 years ago, but collapsed due to internal contradictions and wars resulting from the illegal use of magical powers by the Atlanteans. W. Scott-Elliot, in The History of Atlantis (1896), states that Atlantis eventually split into two big islands, one of which had the name Daitya and the other Ruta, which was later reduced to the last remnant known as Poseidonis. Charles Leadbeater claims that in Tibet there is an occult museum that contains samples of the cultures of all civilizations that have ever existed on Earth, including the civilization of Atlantis. The four maps of the continent depicting the history of its destruction included in Scott-Elliot's History of Atlantis are copies of maps from the Tibetan museum mentioned.

In literature and art

Professor Aronnax and Captain Nemo among the ruins of Atlantis

Atlantis is a source of inspiration for many generations of writers, artists, playwrights, and directors. Many films, books, comics and games are dedicated to the life of Atlantis, the search for it, or use Atlantis as an allegory.

In fantasy literature

In Jules Verne's novel Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Captain Nemo shows Professor Aronnax the remains of the buildings of Atlantis at the bottom Atlantic Ocean; they take a walk along the ocean floor in diving suits.
Later, Wolfgang Hohlbein will continue the theme of Atlantis in his books from the “Children of Captain Nemo” series (“The Girl from Atlantis” and others).
Another writer Pierre Benoit dedicated his novel to the search for Atlantis on the territory of modern Algeria. For more details, see his book “Atlantis” (L’Atlantide, 1919).
In “Aelita” by Alexei Tolstoy, a version of the Atlantean prehistory of mankind is proposed. Atlantis sank to the bottom as a result of a terrible earthquake, but some of the Atlanteans - the Magacites - moved to Mars.
In the novel by Grigory Adamov “The Secret of Two Oceans” (1938; 1939), the flooded Atlantis (in the Atlantic Ocean) is one of the points on the route of the Pioneer submarine.
In the novel “Maracot’s Abyss” (1929) by Arthur Conan Doyle, Professor Maracot and his two companions reach the bottom of the deep Atlantic trench on the bathysphere and there they discover a community of people living in hermetic underground rooms, breathing oxygen produced from water, and who have arranged their existence very comfortably . It turned out that they are the descendants of the inhabitants of Atlantis, who in ancient times were well prepared for the cataclysm that destroyed their continent, and thus survived.
The history of Atlantis was used by John Tolkien as the basis for the plot about Numenor - the sunken ancestral home of the higher people - the Edain. In Quenya, one of the fictional languages of Middle-earth, Númenor was called Atalante (Quenn. Atalantë, “Fallen”).
Science fiction writer Alexander Belyaev in his story “The Last Man from Atlantis” described the existence and death of Atlantis as a result of a tectonic catastrophe. The Bronze Age civilization described in the story worships the sun.
The science fiction novel “Time Spiral” (1966) by Georgy Martynov describes a visit to Atlantis (“the land of Moora”) by aliens from outer space about twelve thousand years ago. The novel describes Atlantis as a society with a level of development and type of government reminiscent of that of ancient Egypt.
In the story “The End of Atlantis” by Kir Bulychev from the “Alice’s Adventures” series, Atlantis turns out to be the base of aliens who have been watching the Earth for centuries. It is located at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean near the Hawaiian Islands.
In the science fiction story of the Romanian writer Victor Kernbach “Boat over Atlantis” - (1961 original. In Russian in the “Library of Adventures and science fiction"in 1971) - describes one of the hypotheses about Atlantis.
The novel Operation Time Search by Andre Norton (1967) uses Churchward's mythology. An American from the 20th century finds himself in ancient world, where there is a war between Atlantis and the Mu civilization. Atlantis is represented by an evil empire that worships the bloody cult of Ba-Al.
The series of novels “Atlanta” by the Russian science fiction writer Dmitry Kolosov is dedicated to the fictional history of Atlantis. Atlantis, according to the main plot, is a planet located in another galaxy on which a utopian society was created. After the capture of the planet Atlantis in the war, the head of state and a few close associates fled to Earth, where they founded a new society according to old models.
In the cycle “The Breath of Death and the Eternity of Love” by the modern science fiction writer Grigory Demidovtsev, the name “Atlantis” is applied to America - accordingly, there are North and South Atlantis. This is due to the fact that in the alternative reality created by Demidovtsev, America was discovered not by Columbus, but by sailors from Nevorus.
In the science fiction novel Illuminati!, Robert Anton Wilson describes the remains of the world of Atlantis during a submarine dive. The Atlanteans were a powerful civilization that perished during the war.
The Dark Visions series by American writer Lisa Jane Smith describes a race (the Brotherhood of the Crystal) that inhabited Atlantis. The few survivors of the destruction of Atlantis moved to other continents.
In Dmitry Olchenko’s story “Beyond the Blue Threshold of Mystery” it is mentioned that Atlantis belonged to the Greek islands and had three brother rulers: Mars, Hephaestus and Hermes. As a result of the murder of the brothers and the numerous wars waged by Mars, Atlantis was drained of blood and devastated. Atlantis sinks under water because the gods could not stand the bloody rule of Mars.
In the story "Temple" by Howard Lovecraft, after an accident, a German submarine sinks to the bottom and finds itself in a flooded city with ancient architecture, where the main building is an ancient temple.
In Robert Sheckley's story “The Tsar's Will,” one of the demons (ferrs) of Atlantis penetrates our world.
In Edgar Burroughs' Tarzan and the Treasure of Opar.
The novel Book of Skulls by science fiction writer Robert Silverberg describes a sect of immortals that arose in Atlantis and carried its secret practices to the present day.
in the cycle “The Path of God” by Anton Kozlov (pseudonym Belozerov) it is described that the island of Atlantis did not drown, but was thrown into another dimension through a black hole

In other literature

In visual arts and media

In painting

Monsu Desiderio. Fall of Atlantis

Fall of Atlantis- the plot of a fantastic painting by French baroque painters, known under the collective pseudonym Monsu Desiderio (XVII century)
Atlant (1921), Death of Atlantis(1929) - paintings by Nicholas Roerich.

Feature films about Atlantis

Atlantis, the Lost Continent (1961) Atlantis, the Lost Continent - USA film
Atlantis: The Lost World (2001) - a Disney cartoon in the steampunk genre
In the television series "Stargate: Atlantis" Atlantis is a city-spaceship of the ancient human race "Ancients", which flew away from the South Pole of the Earth several million years ago. About 10 thousand years ago, Atlantis was sank to the bottom of the ocean, and after the city sank, the Ancients returned through the Star Gate to Earth. In the series, it was from the returning Ancients that Plato learned about Atlantis and its sinking to the bottom of the ocean.

Popular science films about Atlantis

Reconstruction of the death of Poseidonis
Location of the discovery of the disk from the Festus-message of the Atlanteans of the Golden Age
CTC I Want to Believe! Issue 19 - Disappeared Atlantis, where is it?
Myths of humanity. Flood... or in search of Atlantis(English) Myths of Mankind. The Flood... or Looking for Atlantis? ), 2005
: From a scientific point of view: Atlantis (eng. Earth Investigated Atlantis), 2006
Discovery: Unraveling the mysteries of the story with Ollie Steeds. Atlantis (English) Discovery: Solving History with Olly Steeds. Atlantis ), 2010
Mysteries of history. Secrets of Atlantis, 2010
Ancient aliens. Underwater worlds Ancient Aliens. Underwater Worlds ), 2011
The cradle of modern civilization. Atlantans - who are they? 2011

In music

The album of the Spanish rock band Mägo de Oz “Atlantia” (2010), completing the “Gaia” trilogy.
Track Ltj Bukem - Atlantis(I need you)
Album by On Thorns I Lay - Orama
The band's album Symphony X V - The New Mythology Suite is dedicated to the history of Atlantis.
Album by German metal band Atrocity - Atlantis
The album of jazz musician Sun Ra - Atlantis, together with the composition of the same name, is dedicated to Atlantis.
The song by the Swedish band Therion - “Crowning Of Atlantis” is dedicated to Atlantis.
The song of the French metal band Whyzdom - “Atlantis”
The song of the Swedish metal band ReinXeed - “Atlantis”
The song of the group Nautilus Pompilius - “Atlantis” is dedicated to Atlantis.
Song of the group Oddiss "Atlantis"
The song of the Czech metal band Salamandra “Atlantis”
Imperio's song "Atlantis"
Ring Of Fire song "Atlantis"
Song by Modern Talking - “Atlantis Is Calling”
Alexander Gorodnitsky's song “Atlantis” (not to be confused with his more famous song “Atlanta”)
The album of the group Bal-Sagoth - Atlantis Ascendant, as well as a number of other songs from this group.
The 1977 album “Ocean” by Eloy is dedicated to the destruction of Atlantis. In 1998, the group also released a sequel album, called "Ocean 2 - The Answer".
Philip Kirkorov's song "Atlantis"
The EP of the Austrian metal band Visions Of Atlantis - Lost is dedicated to Atlantis, as is the name of the group.
Song of the group Amethyst - “Atlantis”
Songs by Iron Savior, particularly from early albums.
The song of the German NSBM group Bilskirnir – Reconquering Atlantean Supremacy, is about the revival of the great power and wisdom of the Atlanteans.

In games

In 1992, Lucas Arts studio released a computer quest , which has become a classic of the genre. In 1997, the French company Cryo released a quest Atlantis: The Lost Tales, in 1999 - Atlantis II, in 2001 - Atlantis III: The New World on Playstation, in 2004 - Atlantis Evolution.
In the video game Tomb Raider and its remake Tomb Raider: Anniversary, a young archaeologist, Countess Lara Croft is hired by the powerful corporation Natla Technologies to search for three parts ancient artifact"Scion of Atlantis." As the game progresses, it turns out that the head of the corporation, Jacqueline Natla, is the queen of Atlantis, who wants to revive a lost civilization (which she herself destroyed).
In a computer game Age of Mythology: The Titans Atlanteans are one of the playable races.

In animated series

In the animated series “Transformers: Cybertron”, Atlantis is not an ancient sunken island, as earthlings are accustomed to believe, but the city-sized Transformers starship of the same name, which since the disaster has been in the Bermuda Triangle, which is safest to enter underwater (according to the series).
In the animated series “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Atlantis Awakes”, Atlantis is an ancient, but nevertheless active city, inhabited by people and located under a special energy dome at great depths in the Atlantic Ocean, where the main characters get from the New York sewers, led by an ancient creature through named Alim Coelacanth, who then becomes the king of Atlantis according to the Prophecy.
In the animated series "Jackie Chan Adventures" Atlantis is the kingdom of one of the demons of nature, the demoness of the oceans Beisa.

In comics

In comics published by DC Comics, there are several characters originating from Atlantis, including the superhero Aquaman.
In comics published by Marvel Comics, Atlantis is an underwater state inhabited by creatures of a fictional species. homo mermanus. The state is ruled by Namor, who is a hybrid of a human and an Atlantean.
Dark Horse Comics has released a comic book about the adventures of Indiana Jones in Atlantis, based on the game Indiana Jones & The Fate Of Atlantis: The Graphic Adventure.
Atlantis appeared in the backstory of the Hellboy comics, where it was an outpost of Hyperborea.

"Atlantis" on Google Earth

Notes

Ph.D. V. Gulyaev The lost continents of Atlantis and Mu on the Neanderthal map. On the website Alterplan.ru
Shchipkov B. R. Aristotle and Atlantis
seals?
although negligible ancient texts have reached us, especially on papyrus
excluding one single one, directly marked “in the native Gadir”
Magazine "Around the World". The address of Atlantis is the Celtic shelf?
Noah's Flood: The New Scientific Discoveries About The Event That Changed History
Noah's Not-so-big Flood
Anoprienko A.Ya. Atlantis and Indo-European civilization: new facts, arguments and models. - Donetsk: “UNITECH”, 2007. - 516 p. - ISBN 966-8248-12-0
Geologists Link Black Sea Deluge To Farming's Rise
Safronov V. A. Indo-European ancestral homelands
PREHISTORIC DACIA by Nicolae Densusianu, PART 6 - Ch.XXXIV (English)
E. A. Zakharova. On the question of the chthonic essence of the cult of Achilles in the Northern Black Sea region
(English)
Barbiero Flavio. "Una Civiltà sotto Ghiaccio". - 2000.
Magazine “Technology for Youth” No. 06/1999. Atlantis - Antarctica
Pedro Cieza de Leon.

One should not assume that only seas and lakes disappear and appear. Islands appear and disappear in the same way. The best example of this is history of Atlantis, an island that was larger than Libya and Asia combined.

History of the island of Atlantis

Atlantis Island

Of course, in the time of Plato, (more details:) the size of both Libya and Asia was represented differently, but still Atlantis Island was not small.

The ancient Greek scientist Plato was the first to talk about Atlantis

The Atlantis hypothesis begins with Plato's dialogues Timaeus and Critias. In them, the great ancient Greek scientist talks about the once existing big island in the Atlantic Ocean, which was swallowed up by abysses of water.

But what does Plato explain? An ancient legend or your own fiction about a mythical island? Or maybe he is reporting real facts about the existence of an ancient civilization, information about which came to him by chance? So what is this story of Plato - legend, hypothesis, reality? Since the first half of the 4th century BC, attempts have been made to answer this question. But there is still no definitive answer.

Legends about Atlantis

Legends about Atlantis have inspired writers and poets more than once.

Remember Julierne's Captain Nemo, who, with his arms crossed on his chest, looks at a beautiful city, illuminated by an underwater volcanic eruption. In front of him is the dead Atlantis...
From the golden top of the giant pyramid, spacecraft resembling huge eggs take off to carry the last Atlanteans away from the raging elements to distant Mars. And the waves of the ocean are already licking its foot, and the tremors of the raging earthquake are absorbing the legendary “City of a Hundred Golden Gates”. You probably remember this picture, it was painted in “Aelita” by Alexey Tolstoy.
And here’s another thing: Aksa Guam, a priest who rebelled against the omnipotent priests in the pages of Alexander Belyaev’s story “The Last Man from Atlantis,” steps onto the rocky shore of Europe.

And this list could be continued almost endlessly, a list of wonderful inventions generated by an ancient legend.

Atlantis in scientific literature

There is about Atlantis literature and other kinds. No less fantastic in content, but still claiming the right to be called scientific literature.

One of these books was quite self-confidently called “The History of Atlantis.”

And the author of another was Schliemann, the grandson of the man who discovered the stones of the legendary Troy from under the layers of many centuries. Shamelessly speculating on the name of his famous grandfather, he titled the book quite pretentiously: “How I Found the Lost Atlantis.” Both of these books are from the stream of so-called “occult literature”, which shrouded the problem of Atlantis in such a thick mystical fog that for some scientists even today it obscures the scientific significance of this problem.
At the same time real science is interested in the problem of Atlantis, since there are countless questions associated with it that are awaiting solutions:

Here, it would seem, is a science very far from the problem of Atlantis - botany. Where is the birthplace of the banana, a plant cultivated so long ago that it can now only be propagated by cuttings? How did bananas become one of the cultivated plants in America and Africa?
Where is the homeland of maize - a plant that is now one of the famous “three” main breads of mankind along with wheat and rice? Modern corn is completely incapable of reproducing by self-sowing, and no plants have been found that could be considered its ancestors. Meanwhile, corn has long been known not only in America, but also in Africa. So where did this plant come from in the cultivated cereals of two continents?
Here is comparative linguistics. How did the roots of Greek words get into the Mayan language - one of the Indian peoples who inhabited Central America?
How did the word “atlas” get from America to Europe? From North Africa this word became the name of the Atlantic Ocean. Meanwhile, it has nothing in common with European languages, but in the Pagua language, which has long lived in Mexico, words with the same root mean “water”, “sea”, “death”.
Why do the myths of the American continent preserve stories about the death of a land located overseas in the east, and in the legends of European peoples about a drowned land overseas in the west?
History of culture. Why were ancient sculptures of lions and other animals that do not live in America found in Peru, and in Europe no less ancient images of saber-toothed tigers that became extinct here about 300 thousand years ago?
Why was the custom of making mummies common not only in Egypt, but also among the Mayans in Central America?
Ethnography. Why do Cro-Magnons, the ancient ancestors of Europeans, and some Indian tribes have close anthropological similarities?
Zoology. Why do eels from the rivers of Western Europe go to spawn in the Sargasso Sea, whose algae are related to the Mediterranean?
Wild horses were known in Europe in the Paleolithic era; they were used as a hunting object by cavemen. Then their traces disappear, and in the Bronze Age a domestic horse appears. Who carried out this domestication?

It seems that these and many other questions do not give the right to unconditionally deny the existence of Atlantis, although they do not give the right to assert that Atlantis existed. Therefore, again and again, researchers turn to the primary source of information about the sunken continent, to two dialogues of Plato.

The history of Atlantis in Bryusov's poem

One of the first in modern times to make an attempt to explore the history of Atlantis was the remarkable Russian poet.

The history of Atlantis was described in his works by the Russian poet Valery Bryusov

He was an amazing person, a poet, writer, mathematician, a great expert on ancient history, and an expert in research in various fields of the natural sciences. The problem of Atlantis interested him literally from childhood. In his youth he worked on poem "Atlantis".

During the years of creative maturity, he wrote a series of poems devoted to the same problem. He published a large scientific work, “Teachers of Teachers.” The poet-scientist called the ancient inhabitants of Atlantis teachers of teachers, in which

all knowledge has arisen

and in which

everything that was possible was achieved by the first children of the Earth.

(lines from Bryusov’s “Atlantic” cycle of poems are in quotation marks). He made an attempt to trace their influence on the most ancient peoples of the world, and primarily on the Cretan-Mycenaean culture.

Having analyzed the stages of development of ancient cultures, including Egyptian and Aegean, Bryusov comes to the conclusion that their initial stages are strange and incomprehensible.

Egyptian culture begins mysteriously: the oldest pyramids are also the tallest. The origins of their arts are unclear, they suddenly appear before the astonished world, like Pallas Athena, who emerged in dress and armor from the head of Zeus.

Bryusov sees something similar in the Cretan-Mycenaean culture. The legendary labyrinth appears as if suddenly. Before him, only the remains of people who had not yet emerged from the Stone Age could be discovered on the island. Shouldn't this leap be explained by someone's influence that spread to the culture of peoples living on different continents? Doesn't all this testify to the existence in ancient times of a people who became a universal mentor,

teacher of teachers?

It was after these considerations that the poet-scientist moved on to that culture that could lay claim to the honor of being called

teachers teachers.

Tradition told him the right name - Atlantis. And in search of an answer, Bryusov turns to Plato’s “Dialogues”.

Based on contemporary data about Atlantis, analyzing Plato’s messages, Bryusov comes to the conclusion (lines from the work “Teachers of Teachers”):

If we assume that Plato’s description is a fiction, it will be necessary to recognize Plato as a superhuman genius, who was able to predict the development of science for thousands of years to come, to foresee that one day learned historians will discover the world of Aegean and establish its relations with Egypt, that Columbus will discover America, and archaeologists will restore the civilization of the ancient Mayans, etc.

Needless to say, with all our respect for the genius of the great Greek philosopher, such insight seems impossible to us and that we consider another explanation simpler and more plausible: Plato had at his disposal (Egyptian) materials dating back to ancient times.

The method adopted by Valery Bryusov is simple and logical: he read Plato’s dialogues and compared them with the objective level of knowledge of the ancient philosopher as a man of his time. Based on this, the poet comes to the conclusion that Plato could only obtain most of the information contained in the Dialogues from people who knew about the existence of Atlantis. Well, for example,

Plato, like all Greeks, knew nothing about the Aegean kingdoms, which preceded the Hellenic ones on the soil of Greece. Therefore, Plato could not have any reason to invent a strong state in Attica many centuries before the beginning of Greek history.

Plato writes that Atlantis was located on the islands beyond the Pillars of Hercules (i.e., beyond the Strait of Gibraltar) and from it it was possible, sailing further west, to get to another “opposite” continent. But the ancient Greeks knew nothing about America! Doesn't this indicate that this data also reached Plato from some competent source?

Having established in this way that on the very first pages of his dialogues Plato makes two brilliant discoveries in different fields of science - in history and geography, Bryusov is convinced that even in seemingly insignificant details Plato turns out to be surprisingly close to the truth. This applies, say, to the unknown metal orichalcum. After there was no place for it in the periodic table, its very existence became doubtful.

Bryusov believed, however, that this unknown metal could be aluminum. True, to obtain it, electric current is used, which the Atlanteans did not know about. Or maybe they knew another method for producing aluminum?

To this we can add historical fact, reported by the ancient historian Pliny: in the first years of our era, an unknown craftsman brought to the Roman emperor Tiberius a metal bowl that shone like silver, but was extremely light. The master said that he got this metal from clay soil. Tiberius, fearing that the new metal would devalue his gold and silver reserves, ordered the master's head to be cut off. It is quite possible that we are also talking about aluminum.

Ancient historian Pliny

Scientists believe that orichalcum could be a natural alloy of copper and zinc, or modern brass. Occasionally there are ores containing both of these metals. This alloy also corresponds to the color of orichalcum - “red, the color of fire.” In Plato's Dialogues we learn about the flora and fauna of Atlantis. They are described surprisingly realistically.

Apparently, elephants and horses can be considered the most fantastic in the fauna of Atlantis. According to Plato, the Atlanteans had horses and elephants in their colonies in Africa and America. But this does not at all contradict the truth: both horses and elephants in America became extinct relatively recently.

In “Teachers of Teachers” Bryusov, getting acquainted with the description of the capital of Atlantis - the City of the Golden Gate, believes that he too

also does not go beyond the scope of the possible... The statue of Poseidon, described by Plato, was enormous, but it is also close in size to the statue of Olympian Zeus, sculpted by Phidias... And in general, in the entire description there is not a single feature that would expose deliberate fiction...

Bryusov writes. Does Plato's description of Atlantis correspond to new scientific data? After Bryusov, scientists returned to this issue more than once and found new surprising coincidences. Well, for example, the two springs that feed Plato’s Atlantis - hot and cold water - could actually be on an island associated with active volcanic activity. Scientists also found a tree that was mysterious, perhaps even to Plato himself,

which provides drink, food, and ointment.

It could be a coconut palm, which actually provides “drink” - coconut milk, and “food” - nut pulp, and “ointment” - semi-liquid coconut oil. Even Plato’s remark that the walls and towers of the Golden Gate City were made of stone of three colors: white, black, red - found interesting confirmation: it was from such stones that the cities in the Azores were built; they are sometimes considered the mountain peaks of the sunken Atlantis.

Research conducted in recent years has confirmed Plato's date for the tragic catastrophe, when the remains of a giant transatlantic island that once connected two great continents sank to the bottom of the ocean. What does not confirm such an ancient date? Changing currents?

Ocean currents to one degree or another determine the climate of the continents. Perhaps their appearance and disappearance is the rocket at whose signal the glaciers begin to move? Melting, glaciers expose the earth's surface, leaving giant blocks of boulders, as if abandoned in a panicked retreat. Well, why do sea currents appear and disappear?

Atlantologist E. F. Hagemeister suggested that the end of the last ice age was caused by the breakthrough of the warm Gulf Stream into the cold Arctic Ocean. And what happened, she believes, is because

Atlantis sank to the bottom of the ocean and opened the way for the Gulf Stream.

The academician completely agreed with this assumption V. A. Obruchev. He wrote:

The sinking of Atlantis again cleared the way for the Gulf Stream, and in the north its warm waters gradually stopped glaciation around the North Pole.

The remains of living creatures found in sediments on the ocean floor can tell a lot. Here, for example, is what foraminifera testify to. The coils of the spirals of foraminiferal shells are twisted to the left in heat-loving forms, and to the right in cold-loving forms. By studying soil cores taken in the North Atlantic, scientists came to the conclusion that about 10-13 thousand years ago, the waters of the North Atlantic warmed sharply. This is also associated with the breakthrough of the warm waters of the Gulf Stream.

But when did this happen? Russian hydrogeologist , examining soil samples from the bottom of the polar seas, found that for the first time the hot flow of the Gulf Stream penetrated into northern seas about 12 thousand years ago. This was shown by radioisotope analysis.

Russian hydrogeologist M. M. Ermolaev - conducted radioisotope analysis of soil from the bottom of the polar seas

American scientists obtained similar results. They explored volcanic ash, which is found in sediments at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. And it turned out that he appeared here about 12 thousand years ago. This once again confirmed the legendary date of the death of Atlantis: the island sank to the bottom of the ocean under the thunderous salute of volcanic eruptions.

Most of Bryusov's work is devoted to connections between the most ancient civilizations of our planet. The poet-scientist pays special attention to the Cretan-Mycenaean culture. His book was published when the excavations in Crete were not yet completed. This gave her additional interest, which the author could not help but take into account. Well, does science today confirm the existence of such connections?

The most ancient civilizations of our planet

Exactly the question ancient civilizations our planet is dedicated to the book by A. A. Gorbovsky “Riddles ancient history" Some of Gorbovsky’s conclusions can be questioned, but the facts he provides are usually accurate. And they most often concern the most ancient ideas about structure. Well, for example:

The idea of a plurality of inhabited worlds, for which Giordano Bruno was burned. It turns out that it was stated as an immutable truth by Egyptian texts, sacred books ancient india and Tibet. Gorbovsky quotes the ancient Sanskrit book “Vishnu Purana”:
Our Earth is only one of thousands of millions of similar inhabited worlds located in the Universe.

The idea that creatures similar to humans live on distant stars also existed in ancient times in Peru.
Another example - The ancient Egyptians knew about it.
“The earth was in front of me like a round ball”

This quote is from the Leiden Demotic Papyrus. The Aztecs depicted the planets as small circles or balls that the gods played with.
In the Middle East, in Ancient Egypt and in India the year was divided into 12 months. But why did the same division exist in South America? Why was the ancient Mayan year, which had 360 days, used in Ancient Egypt, Babylon and India?
The ancient Greeks, Indians, Celts, Mayans divided the history of mankind into four periods, and each of them was considered to be painted with a special paint. It is surprising that they all considered the last, fourth, period to be painted black.
Another example. The biblical myth about the construction of the Tower of Babel and the subsequent confusion of languages is well known. It is not surprising that the Babylonians have a similar story: the creators of the Bible simply stole it. But where did this legend come from? Ancient Mexico? But they talk about it in these words:

They built high tower... But their languages suddenly mixed up, they could no longer understand each other and went to live in different parts of the Earth.

And again, and again... You can often read that legends about the “universal flood” are common only among coastal peoples and that these are memories of previous floods. In fact, there is no such ancient people that would not have this legend.

Everyone knows the story of the Bible. Many people know that it is borrowed from the ancient Sumerian epic of Gilgamesh. But the English ethnologist reports that of the 130 Indian tribes of North, Central and South America, there is not a single one that does not have a myth about the great catastrophe.

English ethnologist J. Fraser

In the fifty post-Bryusov years, this list has lengthened almost to infinity.

It would be fair to consider that Valery Bryusov’s work “Teachers of Teachers” summed up the first period of studying the problem of Atlantis, turning the legend set out in Plato’s dialogues into a scientific document. The author himself assessed the outcome of his work approximately in this way: “From now on, the “problem of Atlantis” leaves the realm of fortune-telling, becomes a definite historical hypothesis and should share the usual fate of scientific hypotheses, depending on whether newly discovered facts will refute or confirm it.”

And yet, it would not be entirely fair if we, having paid tribute to the merits of Bryusov’s work, remain silent about its fatal flaw: carried away by the enchanting legend, he recklessly considered the culture of the Atlanteans to be extremely high.

Over the course of thousands of years, their power increased and their culture developed, reaching a height that, perhaps, none of the earthly peoples reached after that.

This assessment was obviously facilitated by the influence of books by occultists who believed that the Atlanteans knew aeronautics, rocketry, etc.

Scientists, in particular N. F. Zhirov, carefully analyzed the question of how high culture Plato describes.

What metals does Plato talk about? About gold, silver, lead, iron, about the mysterious orichalcum? But gold and silver are found in native form, and their abundance in the Atlantean capital does not indicate that these metals were widely used in the life of the city. Iron, which is mentioned only once by Plato, was probably meteoric.

After all, in the “Dialogues” there is no mention of iron or bronze weapons or tools. Metals were used only for cladding giant stone walls or for decorating temples. All this cannot be considered evidence of the onset of the Copper or, especially, the Bronze Age. Both weapons and tools, say, for cultivating the land, and household products were made only from stone and bone, which is quite consistent with the Stone Age.

Plato also does not mention lime, cement, and gypsum as binders. building materials. Metals, primarily copper, were apparently used to hold the wall blocks together. This also corresponds to the first period of transition from the Stone to the Bronze Age. There is nothing contradictory in Plato's story about gigantic sizes temples. It is at this stage of development that many peoples of the world gravitate towards gigantism in architecture.

A number of authors associate megalithic buildings scattered along almost all sea coasts with the Atlantean culture globe. There are especially many of them in Western Europe. Megaliths are structures made of unhewn or semi-hewn giant blocks of stone, laid in rows or circles. They were built so long ago that even legends about it are silent. But they are known in Europe, South America, Palestine, Ethiopia, India, Japan, and Madagascar. There is only one doubt - these structures must have been built by Stone Age people.

Megaliths - structures made from unhewn or semi-hewn giant blocks of stone - scientists associate them with the Atlantean culture

The high culture of agriculture does not at all contradict the general assessment of the level of development of the people of Atlantis given by N.F. Zhirov. By the way, agriculture apparently arose 30-20 thousand years ago, which coincides with the date of the heyday and death of Atlantis.

The Russian scientist Doctor of Chemical Sciences N.F. Zhirov can rightfully be considered a major atlantologist. He has written articles in newspapers and magazines, on radio and television, and published several books. The last of them, Atlantis, was published in 1964, several years before his death. According to N.F. Zhirov, the question of the existence of Atlantis should be resolved by science. In particular, oceanology has the final say here. It is she who must answer whether there could have been, and whether there was, several thousand years ago in the Atlantic Ocean, opposite Gibraltar, a fairly large island.

Yes, N.F. Zhirov answers these questions. Atlantis could have existed. Data from modern science indicate that in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean there is an underwater North Atlantic Ridge, which could have existed subaerially (above the surface of the water) at times close to those indicated by Plato in his legend. It is possible that some of these landmasses survived into historical times. So, maybe it makes sense to look for traces of Atlantis on these islands?

The islands of the Atlantic Ocean have long attracted the attention of atlantologists. Unfortunately, there was nothing like a large complex expedition that would conduct thorough archaeological excavations, record everyday rituals and legends, study the flora and fauna in detail, etc., on these islands. Although, according to many assumptions, this is where one should look for the clue to Atlantis.

Some of the Azores islands are associated with interesting legends.

Thus, an equestrian statue was allegedly found on the island of Corvo. The man depicted on it extended his hand to the west. This fact is reported, in particular, by the German scientist R. Hennig.
On other islands, gravestones were found with inscriptions in an unknown language.
On one of the Cape Verde islands, a dolmen and rock inscriptions in the Berber language were found.
Some experts consider the population of the Canary Islands to be direct descendants of the Atlanteans. After a brutal war carried out by the Spaniards against the population of the islands, who did not know either metal or, let alone, firearms, the twenty thousand population of the islands was destroyed. By 1600, not a single purebred Aborigine remained alive. Paleanthropological studies have shown that the Aborigines belonged to various ethnic groups. These conclusions were made by the French scientist R. Verno, after excavating the corresponding burials. The Guanches, as the inhabitants of these islands are called, spoke in languages of Berber origin. Two types of rock inscriptions have also been discovered. It is believed that one of these types is related to the hieroglyphs of Crete. But not a single inscription has yet been deciphered or read. During one of the first visits to the islands by the Portuguese, a statue of a man holding a ball in his hand was discovered here. She was taken to Lisbon, but her whereabouts are now unknown.

The bottom of the ocean also hides quite a few interesting things.

A Swedish oceanographic expedition on the ship "Albatross" discovered freshwater diatoms in one of the soil columns raised from the bottom west of Africa. Maybe they were washed out into the ocean by the waters of the Congo or Niger Rivers? But in this case, freshwater species would be mixed with marine species. It is more logical to assume that the soil column was taken from where a freshwater lake was once located.

Unfortunately, so far scientists have not been able to recover either a statue of Poseidon or even a fragment of his trident from the site of the destruction of Atlantis. But still there were finds...

In the mid-50s, a sea dredge lifted about a ton of very strange formations from the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean south of the Azores Islands. These were limestone discs with a depression on one side, giving them the appearance of plates. On average, the diameter of these disks reached 15 centimeters, and the thickness was 4 centimeters. Their outer side was relatively smooth, but the inside of the depressions was rough. The strange shape of these formations indicates their artificial origin. It was also possible to establish the age of these “sea biscuits”. It turned out to be equal to 12 thousand years, which corresponds to the date of the death of Atlantis. It was possible to establish something else: the “biscuits” were made under atmospheric conditions. By whom? For what? How did they get to the top of the underwater mountain?

N.F. Zhirov in his book mentions the custom that existed among some Caucasian peoples of sacrificing food to spirits on the tops of mountains. Perhaps the “sea biscuits” found were plates for similar sacrifices performed by the inhabitants of Atlantis?

These are the few evidences of the existence of Atlantis. There were incomparably more of them that could have been cited.

Well, in general, what can we say about the problem of Atlantis from the level of modern knowledge?

First of all, the mountain range located in the center of the Atlantic Ocean is the center of numerous earthquakes. This indicates high seismic activity in this area.
There are a number of areas in the Atlantic Ocean that were dry land relatively recently, and
for all these places,

N.F. Zhirov notes:

we do not exclude the possibility of the existence of islands even in historical times; some of them may have been inhabited.
The scientist compares information about the islands that existed in historical times, available on modern maps. Surprisingly, they are identical. However
there is every reason to assume the possibility of subsidence of individual islands and banks of the North Atlantic in our historical time, which had the character of a cataclysm.

This explains the impossibility of such identification in a number of cases.
However, there is a lot of evidence of the existence of Atlantis exactly where it should be expected, according to Plato. Thus, relatively recently a piece of coral was lifted aboard the ship “Mikhail Lomonosov” from one of the peaks of the North Atlantic Ridge. As you know, corals live only at relatively shallow depths. And since the coral was raised with a piece of bedrock from a depth of two and a half kilometers, it remains to be assumed that recently this is where the mountain range sank into the depths of the ocean by at least two kilometers.
And although many scientists categorically deny the possibility of the existence in historical times of large areas of land in the Atlantic Ocean, there are experts who equally confidently assert: yes, Atlantis could have existed and disappeared precisely in the time period that Plato spoke about, i.e. about 12 thousand years ago. In any case, it was at this time that serious changes took place in the Atlantic Ocean, accompanied by fractures of the earth’s crust, volcanic eruptions, changes in ocean currents, perhaps a warming of everything northern hemisphere which caused the end of the Ice Age.

More than half a century has passed since Bryusov wrote his work “Teachers of Teachers.” To our greatest regret, to this day the general attitude of scientists towards this issue has not essentially changed. Most people still regard Plato's story as an unfounded fabrication. Evidence of this is that “the narratives of ancient writers, as we know, are full of such fabulous tales.” There has been no new evidence of this over the past years. And the quote given here dates back to the very beginning of our century. One often gets the impression that the “opponents of Atlantis” did not read Bryusov’s works. However, this is also possible.

Bryusov's work was published only once, in 1917, in a magazine that was published in a negligible circulation. Time did not help his fame either: the world was then shocked World War. Russia was on the eve of revolution. Lively problems modern life were incomparably more important than the history of the continent that drowned thousands of years ago. And very soon the article “Teachers of Teachers” became a bibliographic rarity. And she did not have the opportunity to convince readers that a particular “fabulous tale” contains too much information that Plato could not have had, and this requires a more lenient attitude towards him. It remained the property of only specialist atlantologists who, in their own ways, came to the same conclusion.

But we must not forget something else. The world has entered an era of scientific and technological revolution, capturing ever new areas of knowledge. The ocean also succumbed to this uncontrollable pressure of science. Researchers have already reached its maximum depths in bathyscaphes. And without descending into the abyss of the ocean, scientists can already study its bottom in order to find the ruins of giant temples, the remains of city walls and surrounding canals. There is almost no doubt that such search for Atlantis will be undertaken in the near future.

What machines, devices, devices will they work with? Of course, clumsy, clumsy bathyscaphes are not very suitable for working on the ocean floor. But perhaps bathyscaphes will not be needed for this. Perhaps the search for Atlantis will be carried out by atlantologists and scuba divers.

Atlantologists-scuba divers?! At a depth of more than 3 thousand meters?! Are such depths accessible to scuba divers? Or will they be available?

It's difficult to answer this question. After all, scuba diving as a means of underwater work appeared quite recently, in 1943, J. I. Cousteau initially believed that this invention of his would help a person master a maximum of two to three tens of meters of water. But…

Here are the record dives for the post-war 30 years. It must be said that in our time, today's record becomes a publicly available value tomorrow. This can be confirmed, say, by the increase in speeds of cars and airplanes. Probably everyone remembers the story of airplanes breaking sound speed. How long ago was it?! And today, supersonic passenger aircraft have become an everyday reality in many countries around the world. The same thing happens with the diving depth records achieved by scuba divers.

So, the first tens of meters are accessible to an amateur scuba diver who has put on scuba gear for the first time. But we must not cross the permissible physiological threshold. This threshold is breathing with highly compressed air. In this case, the blood becomes oversaturated with oxygen and nitrogen dissolved in it. Oversaturation with oxygen causes convulsions, and with nitrogen - intoxication and leads to decompression sickness. At the same time, nitrogen dissolved in the blood begins to be released directly into the veins and arteries. And a person often dies.

To prevent this from happening, divers rise from the depths extremely slowly, and then the blood has time to free itself from excess nitrogen. In this case, the ascent from a depth of a hundred meters drags on for 5 hours.

The ingenious idea of a Swiss scientist helped defeat decompression sickness Hansa Keller A. The essence of this idea is to use various gas mixtures when rising from great depths. Once, when testing his idea, he rose from a depth of 222 meters in just 53 minutes! But the record for diving in a diving suit was only 180 meters, and the rise from this depth took 12 hours.

Keller descended to a depth of 400 meters. This was in 1960-1962.

In 1970, English scuba divers descended to a depth of 457 meters. But at the end of the same year, the French moved it beyond the half-kilometer mark; they reached 520 meters! And in 1972, an even greater depth was taken - 565 meters.

The next step amazes with its boldness and magnitude. Four American volunteers descended to a depth of 1520 meters, spent 4 hours at the indicated depth and rose to the surface without any harm to themselves. True, the last experiment was carried out in a pressure chamber, but this does not change the essence of the matter.

Depth reached!

All that remains is to double or triple it, and the depths of Atlantis will be at the mercy of scuba divers. They will be able to search for sunken land and, without returning to the surface of the ocean, relax in special underwater houses. Today, underwater houses of various designs are being tested in the USA, Holland and Italy, Japan and Cuba.

Atlantis has been described by many researchers as the most advanced of human civilizations. Some believe that the city was destroyed by one of the greatest natural disasters known to man, while others are inclined to believe that this is nothing more than just a figment of Plato's imagination. This article contains some "facts", concept images and videos. Let's dream a little together, immersing ourselves in the story of Atlantis.

The legend of Atlantis begins with two dialogues: Timaeus and Critias, written by the classical Greek philosopher, Plato. He describes the Atlanteans as noble and strong people who lived on an island located in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Greek myths tell us that Poseidon created a home for the mortal woman Cleito, with whom he fell in love. To protect her, he surrounded the island with rings of water and earth.

Cleito soon gave birth to 5 pairs of twin boys, who became the rulers of the country. Atlas became the first king. Atlantis was a thriving center of trade due to its location and natural resources.

Unfortunately, as happened with everyone lost civilizations, greed and power began to corrupt the inhabitants of Atlantis. Zeus was outraged by the immorality of people and had to decide the fate of Atlantis by gathering other gods and determining punishment. At the peak of its greatness, Atlantis was swallowed up by sea waves after a terrible earthquake.

It is believed that the center of Atlantis was connected to the sea by an extremely large and deep channel - almost 9 km long, 100 m wide and 30 m deep. It was even deeper than the Panama Canal, which reaches 18 meters at its deepest location.

At the very top of the central mountain a temple was built in honor of Poseidon. Inside was a statue of Poseidon on a chariot with winged horses (Pegasi). The statue was usually surrounded by the senior rulers of Atlantis, who discussed laws here, made decisions and paid tribute to Poseidon.

The main city of Atlantis was located outside the 1st ring of water and covered 17 km of land. It was very densely populated, with most of the inhabitants living here. Outside the city were fertile fields and farms 530 km long and 190 km wide, surrounded by another canal used to collect water from rivers and mountain streams. Every year, the climate of Atlantis allowed for 2 harvests. One in winter, which was fed by rainfall, and one in summer, which was fed by irrigation from canals.

High mountains surrounded the plain in the north of the 3rd circle. Small villages, lakes, rivers and meadows covered much of this area. In addition to lush vegetation, the island was very rich in various metals (gold, copper, bronze, silver) and several types of stone. It is also believed that elephants lived here.

Due to the size of its army and navy, which consisted of approximately 1,200 ships, Atlantis was able to rule lands far beyond its borders, including Egypt.

Today there are a few places in the world where you can experience a little of the atmosphere of Atlantis: The Palm of Dubai and Atlantic Paradise (Bahamas). Below are some photos of these places:

It's always interesting to see how other people feel and imagine Atlantis. Below are some artistic works by artists from different parts of the world. Enjoy! Humanity can only hope that Atlantis will soon become one of the new

Atlantis: legend, history and interesting facts. Atlantis - legend or reality